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Viola paced around the parlor of the small apartment above the New York Age’s offices and print shop, where she and Jianyu had been staying since they’d sent Cela away. She tried not to think of the minutes that had already passed. Jianyu should have been back by long before now.
She hated waiting in the cramped set of rooms while Jianyu went out to search for answers to the question of Newton’s Sigils. She would rather have gone with him. With Nibsy in control of the marks, it wouldn’t do for them both to be caught. This way, at least, should one of them be found by Nibsy or the Order—or any of the factions that might be hunting for them—the other could go on. Because someone needed to warn the Johnsons and wait for Harte and Esta. Someone would remain to continue fighting.
The door swung open suddenly, and Viola startled to her feet, a knife already in her hand, before she realized it wasn’t an attack. The soft warmth of the old magic brushed against her skin as Jianyu appeared in the open doorway.
“Where have you been?” she demanded.
“We need to find Joshua,” he said at the same time. “We need to send word to Cela as well. To anyone who could keep her safe.”
His words brushed away whatever comforting warmth his magic had just created and replaced it with an icy feeling of dread. Viola lowered the knife that had already been aimed at Jianyu’s heart at the same time she registered the panic and fear in his eyes. “What are you talking about?”
“Nibsy knows where Cela is,” Jianyu said, his voice tight with a fury that Viola had rarely heard there. He closed the door solidly behind him and latched it for good measure. He was breathing heavily, as though he’d run across the city, and he leaned now against the back of a chair, trying to catch his breath.
“No,” she told him, unwilling to believe what he was telling her. “That’s not possible.”
Jianyu’s expression grew grim. “We have to send word to Joshua. She must be warned.”
Viola shook her head. “Joshua, he left yesterday, remember? He’ll be gone for three weeks.”
“Then we must find another messenger,” Jianyu said. She’d never seen him so frantic.
“Jianyu, slow down,” she told him gently. “How could Nibsy have found Cela?”
“Your brother’s men,” Jianyu told her, looking more than a little disgusted. “He used the Five Pointers. He’s sending them after her.”
She knew that Nibsy and the Five Pointers had an alliance, but Johnny the Fox hadn’t worked to claim command over Paul Kelly’s gang only to hand his power to a boy. Especially not when the Fox hated Mageus every bit as much as her brother. “Why would Torrio follow Nibsy Lorcan’s orders?”
“I do not know,” Jianyu said, looking more shaken than Viola had ever seen him.
Because he cares for Cela.
“Are you sure Nibsy knows? Are you sure he isn’t bluffing?” she asked
Jianyu raked his hand through already disheveled hair and shook his head. “He would not lie about such a thing.”
“Of course he would,” Viola told him. “Nibsy would lie about anything if he thought it would help him get his way.”
“He knows she is in Atlantic City, Viola.”
Dread curled in her stomach. If Nibsy knew that, he already knew too much.
“What if this is nothing more than a trap?” Viola asked, trying desperately for some other explanation. “Atlantic City, it’s a big place, no? Maybe he don’t know so much as he says. Maybe he wants us to run like scared rabbits and warn her, so his men, they can follow.”
“We cannot take that chance,” he told her, worry coloring his sharp features.
She understood what he was feeling. Madonna, did she understand. Hadn’t she felt the same way when she saw Ruby being attacked by that terrible stone beast at Morgan’s gala? She’d felt so helpless, so desperate, that she’d acted on impulse and skewered Jianyu with her blade by accident. She wouldn’t let him rush in and make the same kind of foolish mistake now.
“Abel will be back soon,” she reminded him. “We expect him tomorrow with news.”
“Tomorrow may be too late.” Jianyu ran a hand through his short hair, making himself look even more disheveled and harried. “I found the information about using the sigils. I had it in my hands. And then Nibsy…”
She understood immediately. Nibsy had the marks. “What could you have done? What can any of us do against the marks?”
Jianyu’s mouth went tight. “I should have died to defend it.”
“If Nibsy Lorcan wanted you dead, he would have made it so,” Viola said, trying not to let her own fear show through her words. “He’s up to something.” Nibsy never would have let Jianyu go if he truly had everything he needed. “We must be careful not to rush and fall into his traps. We must think. Plan.”
“Cela’s safety cannot wait for that,” Jianyu said, shoving aside the chair he’d been leaning on. “Not when the sigils can be used to open a doorway—a passage—out of the Brink.”
